How much privacy can public officials really expect when they post personal information on a gay website?

It really depends on who you’re talking about.

After the Richmond Times-Dispatch published an article about Stephen Johnson, a gay Board of Education member, posting an online profile on Manhunt.net, he received an outpouring of support. Many parents and school officials said his private life is irrelevant to his job as a board member.

As the Internet continues to grow and more people become web-savvy, journalists, activists and ethicists will wrestle with the question of privacy in the public domain for years to come.

Gay personal sites warn users that anyone can access their information.

Gay.com’s privacy policy states, “By choosing to use these areas, you understand and agree that anyone may access and forward any information about you that is contained in or that you post to those areas.”

The case of Jim West

“There is a fair amount of complexity and nuance” when reporting on private lives, said Kelly McBride, an ethicist at the Poynter Institute, a media think-tank in St. Petersburg, Fla. “Newspapers should be as precise about the indiscretions as possible.”

Jim West, the mayor of Spokane, Wash., was forced from office in a recall vote last year after newspaper coverage about his private life that was clearly appropriate, McBride said.

Earlier this year, the Spokesman-Review broke the story that West had met younger men online for sex and offered them trips to Washington, D.C., and internships with his office.

In the case of West, McBride said, “it was this abuse of power.”

“The man lived outrightly as heterosexual, legislated against gay friendly causes,” she said. “I don’t think there’s any question that this was newsworthy. It’s in the public interest to know how he was using his power.”

In the case of Johnson, the Richmond Times-Dispatch published an article about a personal ad he posted on Manhunt.net, a sexually explicit online cruising site for gay men.

In December, after the article was published, Johnson stayed on the Richmond School Board but stepped down as chair. A small group of ministers called for him to resign completely but later backed away from their demands. Many parents and school officials supported Johnson, who told the Houston Voice he never hid his sexual orientation, although it had never been reported and was not widely known.

Uncovering a person’s private life is important when there’s a question of hypocrisy or credibility, according to journalists and activists.

That was the case in Spokane. West tried to legislate against sex for years, even introducing a bill to criminalize sexual contact between minors. West supported a 1986 bill that would have banned gays from working in schools, day care centers and some state agencies.

Activist Keith Boykin said outing a public figure is only appropriate when they have been publicly anti-gay. Simply being conservative is not enough reason to violate a person’s privacy, he said.

Boykin has launched a campaign to uncover personal information about anti-gay pastors.

“If someone is a public figure saying or doing things that are publicly anti-gay and he happens to be gay as well, it’s fair game for the media to raise the issue of their sexuality,” he said. “They don’t have the right to remain in the closet if their actions are hurting other people.”

Michael Signorile, a gay journalist based in New York, agreed that newspapers were right to report on West because of the contradictions between his private and public life.

“I felt with him as a politician railing against gay people, publicly seeking sex with men [it was right to report it],” he said. “He’s using his office to lure sex from these people, promoting them to jobs. It’s a clear cut one.”

However, he said, Internet activity, while not private, often is about fantasy, and the person may not be living out what they say. But because West identified himself, he forfeited his right to privacy.

“The moment he did that, he no longer retained his privacy,” he said. “It no longer becomes private.”

The case of Jeff Gannon

Another person who gave up his right to privacy was James Guckert, who writes under the name Jeff Gannon, Signorile and others said.

After Gannon asked White House press secretary Scott McClellan a question using inaccurate information from radio talkshow host Rush Limbaugh, journalists and bloggers began wondering how he gained access to White House press conferences. What intrigued journalists even more was how McClellan passed over veteran White House correspondents for Gannon.

The Houston Voice and its affiliate publications publish occasional freelance columns by Gannon.

During his time in the White House press corps, Gannon worked for a GOP-linked website called Talon News. Bloggers began to argue that Gannon, and the so-called news agency, were far from independent.

They also uncovered that Gannon had previously posted a website advertising his services as a male escort and mainstream media joined in the reporting, offering varying level of details.

Gannon said last year that his critics unfairly attacked him personally.

“My past is not relevant, and my private life was not relevant to the job I was doing as a reporter,” he told the Houston Voice. “It was a politically motivated act which still continues today.”

Gannon said it was appropriate, on the other hand, to report the Manhunt profile of Johnson, the Richmond school board chair, because Johnson is an elected official.

“At the time people decided to invade my privacy, I was a reporter just like you,” he said. “I don’t know anything about your past.”

But journalists defended coverage of Gannon, arguing that who he is was central to establishing his credibility.

“His online world had shown him soliciting, doing something illegal while going into the White House,” Signorile said. “He forfeited his privacy. He had photos identifiable as him on public websites.

“If I had signs on the street saying, yeah I’m a prostitute and a week later I’m a White House spokesperson … I think it was relevant,” Signorile said. “It was about his credibility, his background, his security clearance.”

McBride agreed, saying that Gannon was “operating as a mouthpiece for a GOP website.”

“If he had just been a regular reporter for a conservative publication I would say no but because of the obfuscation — who he really represents, whether he was really a journalist, the question of who is this guy is very valid,” she said.

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